Description of research and transfer lines:
1) Electromagnetic sensing for non-destructive measurement and inspection enhanced with artificial intelligence.
Development of microwave, millimeter, and submillimeter band components, as well as algorithms for non-destructive component inspection with applications in security, detection of buried objects (e.g., mines), vision through walls, and subsurface inspection. Both electromagnetic imaging and non-image-based techniques are used.
Keywords: non-destructive evaluation, millimeter and submillimeter waves, buried object detection
2) Additive manufacturing applied to the design process of high-frequency antennas and components.
Design and prototyping of high-frequency components for communications systems using additive manufacturing technologies in both plastic and metal, employing techniques such as FDM, SLA, or Laser Powder Bed Fusion (LPBF). The use of these technologies makes it possible to design components with complex geometries, reducing manufacturing costs and reducing the weight of these devices. This latter aspect is very attractive in space applications.
The design process combines traditional electromagnetic analysis techniques with machine learning and deep learning techniques, allowing for reduced design times while maintaining component modeling accuracy.
These combined techniques are particularly successfully applied to the design of lens- and reflector-based antennas in numerous applications, including 5G and B5G communications in complex indoor scenarios such as satellite systems.
The entire design process, plastic prototyping, and experimental validation are capable of being addressed with measurement systems covering frequency bands from 300 MHz to 330 GHz. The available systems allow for validation of the electromagnetic behavior of components and their radiation and signal integrity characteristics, addressing a complete study of the physical layer of the communications system. Keywords: antenna design and optimization (lenses and transmit arrays), waveguide components, additive manufacturing technologies, FDM, SLA, or Laser Powder Bed Fusion (LPBF), AI-assisted design.
3) Design and Implementation of Advanced Communications Systems for Wireless and Satellite Applications.
This line of research focuses on the integrated development of complex antenna systems and multi-user communications techniques to extend coverage and increase data transmission capacity.
This integrated design enables the development of ad-hoc wireless systems in complex and unique environments in the microwave and millimeter bands with better performance than standard commercial systems.
Advanced antenna system design techniques enable the development of prototypes for terrestrial wireless applications (5G, 6G, and future standards, RFID technologies for IoT, V2x inter-vehicular communications, among others) and satellite systems (broadcasting applications, lightweight/deployable antennas for cubesats, and Earth observation, among others).
In many cases, designs focus on harnessing dispersed energy by redirecting it to improve coverage without generating additional energy requirements, providing environmentally sustainable solutions.
The entire design, prototyping, and experimental validation process is possible with measurement systems covering frequency bands from 300 MHz to 330 GHz. Available systems allow for the validation of radiation, propagation, and signal integrity characteristics, addressing a complete physical layer study of the communications system. Keywords: Reflectarrays, Transmitterrays, lenses, deployable antennas, Millimeter wave (mmWave) communications, Terrestrial and satellite communications, Multi-user communications, Ultra-reliable low latency communications (URLLC), Frequency scanning, Remote sensing.
4) Additive manufacturing techniques for the integration of electronic circuits and antennas in textile material.
Development of design, analysis, and manufacturing techniques for the implementation of integrated electronics in textile material, with applications in fields as diverse as healthcare, logistics, smart home, and security.
Development of fully woven prototypes, in which the appropriate combination of conductive and dielectric threads in the 3D textile structure at the time of weaving results in an electromagnetic structure fully integrated into the textile material, which preserves all its inherent properties, such as robustness, flexibility, tolerance to washing cycles, etc. This technology has been used to create antenna designs, frequency-selective surfaces, RFID tags, textile-integrated waveguides, and receivers for simultaneous wireless data and power transmission, among others.
Additive manufacturing techniques for the deposition and delineation of conductive layers on flexible nonwoven materials, with characteristics suitable for integration into smart textiles. Application of these techniques to simultaneous wireless data and power transmission systems.
Keywords: Wearables, IoT, IoMT, antennas, manufacturing technologies, materials, remote power.
5) Wireless technologies for industrial environments and uses with multiple users/sensors in simultaneous operation.
Study of the appropriate use and design of solutions based on wireless communication technologies (5G, Wi-Fi, LoRa, etc.) in industrial environments that require robustness and high-performance communication between machines, control systems, and/or operators. Since these environments typically involve the coexistence of different communication agents (machines, users, etc.), all of them must be able to operate without being affected by interference from each other. Therefore, it is necessary to develop multi-user solutions that allow multiple access. To this end, state-of-the-art techniques based on digital communications, signal processing, and artificial intelligence are considered.
Keywords: Wireless communications, 5G, 6G, Wi-Fi, multi-user, Industry 4.0
6) Communications in areas without infrastructure (lunar surface, caves, forests, deserts, etc.) applied to robots.
Active participation in surface and subsurface communications research, focusing on the development of advanced propagation models and lunar telerobotic communications. Our innovations in lunar communications can be applied to communications in areas without infrastructure, such as caves, forests, and deserts, enabling the development of new technologies in these regions.
Keywords: Propagation in lunar caves, Communications for robotic explorers.
7) Metasurfaces.
Two-dimensional (2D) periodic structures, with unit cell sizes below the wavelength corresponding to the operating frequency, exhibit behaviors not found in natural materials and allow the manipulation of the reflection, transmission, and absorption of electromagnetic fields. They can be used alone or in combination with antennas to improve their performance (increasing bandwidth, improving radiation properties). In wearable applications, they can be used to isolate the antenna from the body, reducing radiation to the human body. They can also be used as radomes (metaradomes), protecting antennas without degrading their performance. They can be manufactured using conventional microwave printed circuit board techniques or additive manufacturing techniques, using both rigid and flexible materials (textiles, plastics). Another key application in security is the reduction (or, more generally, modification) of the radar cross section (RCS).
Keywords: Metasurface, metaradome, High-impedance Surface (HIS), Artificial Magnetic Conductor (AMC), Electromagnetic Band-Gap (EBG).